Inspector Gadget defies age to nail the Road Runner

Jake Niall

THE AFL's oldest player was chasing one of its fastest players. Carlton's answer to the Road Runner, Jeff Garlett, had marked 35 metres from goal, and opted to play on, confident that his speed would enable him to get clear and kick an easy goal.

A goal would all but secure Carlton four premiership points. There were only a few minutes left, and the Blues led by a point in a match that contained multiple dramas and landmark moments.

What Garlett cannot have reckoned on was the canny veteran chasing him: Dustin Fletcher, who defies the life cycle of a footballer. Fletcher, 36 next month, has retained not just his speed and reflexes, but the instincts of a great footballer and the willingness to do, in his coach's words, ''everything possible to win us the game''.

So old man Fletcher set after Garlett. Fletcher, who was coming at Garlett from a different angle, thereby reducing his running distance, lunged and flung those Inspector Gadget arms at the Road Runner. He brought Garlett down in a stunning tackle.

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Holding the ball was the umpire's call, obviously, but the ball spilt to the Bombers and advantage was paid. Fletcher's tackle - as memorable as the match-saving one Carlton's Fraser Brown laid on Dean Wallis in the 1999 preliminary final - allowed the Bombers to emerge with two premiership points, a moral victory of sorts, given the early loss of two players to serious knee injuries.

''I thought he [Garlett] might have stopped and gone back,'' Fletcher told 3AW later. ''But I guess he's pretty quick, so he backed himself … he probably thought 'too old, too slow', but just got hold of him. I was a bit lucky, I think.''

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Brett Ratten would call this a moment he wished he could have back for Garlett to take the set shot.

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These fateful seconds, though, were merely the punctuation point on what had been yet another outstanding performance from Fletcher, who will not go gently into the good night. Indeed, he doesn't appear to be going anywhere - retirement shouldn't even be considered - because one can mount a case that he rivals Jobe Watson as the Dons' best player.

Fletcher pipped Watson, Marc Murphy and Michael Jamison as the most influential player afield, cutting off Carlton attacks, marking and getting that famous fist in for many spoils. As ever, he was clean with the ball; 16 of his 18 disposals were effective.

Fletcher's dominance forced Carlton to put the red vest on the hapless Lachie Henderson, whose struggles were such that the Blues couldn't take full toll of having the extra player on the bench for three quarters.

Fletcher's coach James Hird, who was on the field for many of the defender's 332 games, said of his contribution yesterday: ''I haven't seen Dustin probably play better. He might have played better … but to hold the backline together - and I thought the backline was very good with the amount of entries that were coming in and the way the ball was coming in - [was outstanding].

''Our whole backline played well, led by Dustin, and he's only getting better, and he's … just putting it all out there and whatever happens happens for him, and he is an absolute star and champion of the game.

''And people who talk about him previously about not playing on the best forwards, well, he had roles today on their best forwards, he had roles on the small players, he played all over the ground, he kept cutting off contests, he kept setting up the ground for us, setting up the attack for us; there's nothing more he could have done - he did everything possible to win us the game.''

Fletcher did more than is reasonable to expect from a senior citizen. In his case, you're only as old as the player you're chasing.